Party Politics - Conclusion

In an interview in the summer of 1965, McGeorge Bundy, a former Harvard
dean who served John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson as national security
adviser and was an architect of the Americanization of the Vietnam War,
was asked what was different in the actual conduct of American diplomatic
affairs from how it had seemed to be "from the safety of Harvard
Yard." According to the interviewer, Bundy replied that the first
thing that stood out was "the powerful place of domestic politics
in the formulation of foreign policies."

It was a revealing comment, but not a surprising one (except to the extent
that officials seldom make this admission on the record). The relationship
between domestic politics and foreign policy has been an intimate one
throughout the nation's history. It may be debated whether the
connection is a good thing or a bad thing—whether overall it has
been beneficial to the nation's record on the world stage. For the
moment, though, it is enough to say that the connection is there and is
important. Just why so many students of American diplomacy seemingly have
lost sight of this reality over the years is somewhat of a mystery.
Partly, the inattention can be explained by the historiographical trends
outlined early in this essay, which moved many diplomatic historians away
from giving serious and sustained attention to domestic politics. Partly,
too, it may reflect an overreliance by scholars on official U.S.
government documents in their research; essential though these documents
are, they can mislead. American statesmen have always been averse to
admitting, even to themselves, that their foreign policy decisions could
be affected by private political interest. As a result, a reader of the
vast archival record, finding little or no evidence of partisan wrangling
or election year strategizing, could (wrongly) conclude that these must
have mattered little in shaping American policy.

Whatever the case, it is clear that the influence of party politics on the
American approach to international affairs needs to be identified,
measured, and explained. Foreign policy, it turns out, is always a
political matter. It is not always a crass partisan matter. It is well to
remember that the parties historically have tended to speak for different
constellations of values and interests, different constituencies with
genuine philosophical differences about America's place in the
world, and that those differences have sometimes also been evident within
parties. But it is always political.